FEATURED ARTICLES ABOUT SANDWICHES - PAGE 2

Casual food, good beer and a winning team sure make winter days more tolerable. If you are not spending Super Bowl Sunday watching the Arizona Cardinals and Pittsburgh Steelers at your favorite brewpub, try creating your own pub fare and inviting the gang over for the game. The stellar miniature ham sandwiches served at Hopleaf Bar in Andersonville inspired this supersize warm ham and Gruyere sandwich. Because top-notch ingredients make the best sandwiches, I often roast a ham and even make the condiments.

Cooking fish at home proves challenging for most cooks -- no matter how accomplished your kitchen skills. Obstacle No. 1: Finding the freshest catch. Solutions: Order ahead from the local fish supplier or from the fish counter at the supermarket. Don't forget to check out the freezer case -- sometimes the freshest fish is frozen. Obstacle No. 2: Choosing the right fish -- not just for the recipe but for the environment. The answer: Check out the Right Bite, a guide published by the Shedd Aquarium (sheddaquarium.

Much ink has been spilled over chef Matt Maroni's noble efforts to bring food trucks to the city, but to recap: Maroni — 31, proud Texan, Tuscan-trained, spectacular sideburns — made his name cooking in Houston. Got sick of food scene, moved to Chicago with wife. Spent two years cooking at the Mid-America Club at the Aon Center; fired for "drinking a few cocktails at the bar after service." February 2010. Time on his hands, he thought: high-end quick-service food, assembled in a converted postal van, driven to the masses, social-media powered.

By JeanMarie Brownson, Special to Tribune Newspapers | August 25, 2010

The rhythm of the school year definitely adds structure to our lives. Meals included. From September through June, the pattern rarely varies: A quick bowl of cereal, then a dash for the door toting lunch and healthy snacks. If we're organized, a few minutes devoted to dinner prep. Truth be told, preparing those bagged lunches every weekday feels like a chore. We moan about whose turn it is, struggle for ideas and all too often, slam a pb & j in a sack and go. Prepackaged lunch options no longer satisfy our children, who have grown into young adults.

Life giving you lemons? Making lemonade is so old hat. A sunshiny spritz can find its refreshing way into all sorts of summer foods and drinks, says Yvette van Boven, author of "Home Made Summer" (Stewart Tabori & Chang, $35), a book that celebrates the season. Her love of summer food (and our love of her delicate lemon cookies) proved just enough inspiration for us to make a leap into nostalgic, frosty summer fun. Wait until your guests get a load of where your lemons are going. Lemon thin ice cream sandwiches We adapted van Boven's elegantly thin crisps into the ultimate ice cream sandwich by pairing them with pineapple and coconut ice cream from the supermarket. 1 Heat oven to 400 degrees.

Subway Corp., a fast-growing U.S. food franchise, says 200 of the 2,000 sandwich shops it plans to operate in China's railroad stations will open before 1997. The chain won exclusive rights to open shops at half the country's 4,000 stations.

German officials placed British sandwiches under suspicion Tuesday as possible carriers of foot-and-mouth disease, along with all other meat and milk products, confiscating uneaten food from passengers arriving on flights from Britain at airports across the country. Hunting trophies and other items made from skin or hides also were placed on the warning list. Authorities insist the extra precautions, including spot checks and specially marked trash cans, aren't hysteria. "There is a potential risk that the virus can be carried by food," said Thomas Kossmann, veterinarian for the border control post at Berlin's Tegel airport.

Mom's meatloaf was the typical trifecta: a mixture of ground veal, pork and beef, all bound together with egg and bread crumbs. The best part, though, was the next day, when she gave us slices of the loaf nestled between slices of white bread smeared with mayonnaise for our lunchboxes. Those sandwiches were the best! I still love them. But now I like to vary them a bit by adding a flavored mayonnaise, baby lettuces and switching from Wonder Bread to sourdough or a whole-grained bread.

Sandwiches are one of my passions. I always am on the lookout for fresh, interesting combinations. Earth, a restaurant in Chicago's River North neighborhood, offers some of the best. Owner Barry Bursak, describes the food as "eco-conscious haute cuisine," which means it is prepared primarily with organic ingredients. Wrapped around this great-tasting food is the message that organic agriculture offers significant environmental and health advantages. You can become part of this growing movement too. Look for organic foods in supermarkets and specialty food stores.